WITHNAIL AND I
he last few months of the ’60s, two
neighbors inhabit drab and unsanitary
London flats; Marwood and Withnail
(Paul McGann and Richard E. Grant). They
are semi-hippies; unemployed actors, with
longish hair and relatively conservative,
though seedy, wardrobes. They drink and
do drugs, and commiserate about their
squalid surroundings. Withnail, from a
wealthier family, drinks more, does more
drugs, and is more depressed and
depressing.
The two decide to holiday at Withnail’s
uncle’s country cottage. This uncle
(Richard Griffiths) is hilarious. Into root
vegetables, he sports a radish on his lapel
instead of a flower. He compares the ad­
mirable qualities of the firm young carrot
to the worthless flowers — “ pimps for the
bees.” Withnail gets use of the country
cottage by a ruse, telling gay Uncle Monte
a story so juicy that he later turns up at the
cottage, pining for Marwood. His pursuit
of the paranoid but achingly polite Mar­
wood is one of many funny bits. The con­
versation is witty, though often acerbic.
Some extremely funny scenes occur on the
country holiday as the two bumbling
young know-it-alls have serious troubles
providing themselves with the simplest of
domestic accoutrements — food and fuel.
After a day of vegetables, Withnail shouts,
“ I want something’s flesh.’’ Later they
botch abysmally dealing with a live chicken,
and a surpassingly funny scene takes place
in the local tavern with the town poacher
— a paranoid schizophrenic basket case, if
there ever was one.
This film has been called witty but
monotonous. I found the constant cynicism
of the two young men, particularly With­
nail, to really get across the nihilistic
mindset of the borderline counterculturists
of the times. There were a lot of people
who grew their hair kind of long, boozed it
up, did their drugs, and waited. They
trashed the popular culture models of the
time, and cursed the establishment. Of this
sweetly innocent, yet confrontationally
dynamic time, the filmmakers have a
neatly accurate diagram fleshed out with
the noble and ignoble sufferings of the
young and the guilty.
T
INNER SPACE
Short is wonderful as the bumbling nice
guy who kind of grows on you. He’s very
good at the physical comedy called for.
Meg Ryan was fine as the girl reporter
fighting her yen for the dashing pilot, and
Quaid, as the pilot, is dashing. He's good
at macho, lusty but boyish humor, much in
the same vein as Jack Nicholson, whom he
both resembles and sounds like.
ADVENTURES IN
BABYSITTING
uch like a Martin Scorsese
comedy of last year. After Hours,
where a humble word processor goes from
one impossible and dangerous adventure
M
to another, this story follows a babysitter,
who takes her charges and a neighbor boy
to the city in her mother’s car on an errand
of mercy. The bad news starts with a flat
tire and no spare on the freeway, which
leads them to a nightmare ride in a truck
with a possible maniac, a bullet hole
through Mom’s windshield, being hijacked
by a car thief, then menaced and chased all
night by real mean chop shop and gambl­
ing mafiosi.
From one dangerous situation after
another, the sitter and charges extricate
themselves, through thinking fast, acro­
batics, or just plain chutzpah. All the worst
teen and preteen fears are treated. Sister
tells the sitter about her brother’s crush on
her. Mom mentions the poor kid’s acne in
front of Chris, the sitter. A one-armed man
shows up right after a grisly story about a
one-armed homicidal maniac. The sitter’s
boyfriend is found to have broken their
date to go out with a looser woman. All the
adults around are rude or menacing.
Elizabeth Shue as Chris gives a lovely
performance as the sweet young thing who
learns a lot and squeaks by in style during
the adventuresome night. As the winsome,
but resourceful, high school miss, she’s
engaging and solid. The yuppie sittees are
clean and cute as pedigreed puppies. A
good time is had by all, even the audience. •
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Monday through Friday
Breakfast 7*11:30
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SEVEN-COURSE DINNERS
28 Southwest
Avenue 243-2109
ery funny and original comedy
starring Dennis Quaid as Tuck
Third floor of the Skidmore Fountain Building
2832 S.E. BELMONT* 238-1464
Pendleton, military pilot scheduled to be
on the MAX line
miniaturized to cruise where no man has
—
gone before — in a rabbit.
m
A hijack at just the wrong moment finds
Tuck implanted into Martin Short, who
plays Jack Tupper, a nerd of a grocery
mm
bagger at a Safeway store. Meg Ryan plays
Pendleton’s love interest and Tupper’s
Near Miss. We have here a charming por­
trait of an unrequited menage a trois and
the first known example of male bonding
from the inside out.
Supposedly Pendleton is in a race with
death, as he will run out of air in his little
craft if Tupper and girl friend can’t get a
computer chip back from the bad persons.
It's the only one of its kind. Now you
know, you're even supposed to have dupli­
cates of your bookkeeping records in a
separate location, but do they have a dupli­
cate chip — no-o-o-o-o, of course not!
B rin g a friend.
But, this film was so funny, such minor
239 SW Broadway at Oak 241-4151
technicalities didn't worry even a pseudo­
BREAKFAST LUNCH & DINNER 7 DAYS A WEEK 6:30am-2:30am SATURDAY & SUNDAY 8am-2:30am
intellectual first child such as myself for
very long.
V
J u st W hat The D octor
Breakfast at the
C A F E
(There are some places in this
universe you shouldn't go alone)
A 3
Just Oui. 2 3 . August. 1987
•I .V.tnii/ SS m DW u I